Editor’s Note: The following excerpts have been selected from various works of Champaklal whom the Mother lovingly called as “My Lion.” These selections help the aspirant get some very helpful practical guidance on the sunlit path.
“My Lion” – The Mother (1960)
Champaklalji was extremely fond of this photograph of his with the Mother which she captioned it “My Lion”. While choosing it as the cover for the Gujarati edition of Champaklal Speaks, he noted this incident: Once, on seeing this photo, Pranab’s uncle Charubabu exclaimed, “Mother, here Champaklal looks like Durga’s lion! “ And Mother forcefully replied, “He is my lion!” (Champaklal Speaks. 3rd Edition. Preface)
The Joy of Giving
Question: How can we know that we are receptive?
When we feel the urge to give and the joy of giving to the Divine’s work, then we can be sure that we have become receptive.
~ The Mother, 12 July 1965, Champaklal’s Treasures, 2008 Edition, p. 57
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Give Yourself
My love is always with you; if then you do not feel it, it is because you are not capable of receiving it. It is your receptivity that is lacking and should be increased; for this you must open yourself, and one opens oneself only if one gives oneself.
~ The Mother, Champaklal’s Treasures, 2008 Edition, p. 47
Surely you are trying more or less consciously to draw the forces and the divine love towards you. The method is bad. Give yourself without calculating and without expecting anything in return, and then you will become capable of receiving.
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Three Conditions for a Disciple to Profit Fully from the Guru
Question: Please let me know how can a disciple make the best use of his Guru, the spiritual guide, for his spiritual advancement and the Divine Light or Knowledge.
I could not answer your letter of the 12th at once for want of time. Your question is put in a general form and I can only answer that there are three conditions for a disciple profiting fully from his relation to a spiritual guide.
1st. He must accept him entirely and him alone without submitting himself to any contrary or second influence.
2nd. He must accept the indications given by the Guru and follow them firmly and with full faith and perseverance to the best of his own spiritual capacity.
3rd. He must make himself open and receptive to the Guru, for even more than what the guru teaches to the mind of the disciple, it is what he spiritually is, the spiritual consciousness, the knowledge, the light, the power, the Divinity in him that helps the disciple to grow by his receiving that into himself and its being used within himself for the growth of his consciousness and nature into its own divine possibility.
I answer generally because of the general form of the question; if there is something more precise and particular you hold in mind, you can state it and I will see whether I can give you a more particular answer.
~ Sri Aurobindo, 16 August 1932, Champaklal’s Treasures, 2008 Edition, pp. 232-233
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Also read:
A Very Modern Guru – Excerpts from Nirodbaran’s Talks
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“Everyone who is turned to the Mother is doing my Yoga.”
Question: I cannot understand whether I am doing yoga or not. Can it be said that I am doing your integral yoga?
Everyone who is turned to the Mother is doing my Yoga. It is a great mistake to suppose that one can “do” the Purna Yoga, i.e. carry out and fulfil all the sides of the Yoga by one’s own effort. No human being can do that. What one has to do is to put oneself in the Mother’s hands and open oneself to her by service, by bhakti, by aspiration; then the Mother by her light and force works in him so that the sadhana is done.
It is a mistake also to have the ambition to be a big Purna Yogi or a supramental being and ask oneself how far have I got towards that. The right attitude is to be devoted and given to the Mother and to wish to be whatever she wants you to be. The rest is for the Mother to decide and do in you.
~ Sri Aurobindo, 1 May 1929, Champaklal Speaks, 2001 Edition, p. 334
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Obstacles in Becoming Fit Instruments for the Working of Conscious Force
But what seems to me of more importance is to try to explain how things are worked out here. Indeed very few are the people who understand it and still fewer those who realize it.
There has never been, at any time, a mental plan, a fixed programme or an organization decided beforehand. The whole thing has taken birth, grown and developed as a living being by a movement of consciousness (Chit-tapas) constantly maintained, increased and fortified. As the conscious force descends in matter and radiates, it seeks for fit instruments to express and manifest it. It goes without saying that the more the instrument is open, receptive and plastic, the better are the results.
The two obstacles that stand in the way of smooth and harmonious working in and through the sadhaks are:
(1) The preconceived ideas and mental constructions which block the way to the influence and the working of the Conscious Force,
(2) The preference and impulse of the vital which distort and falsify the expression.
Both these things are the natural output of ego. Without the interference of these two elements my physical intervention would not be necessary.
You are quite right when you do not believe in “Mother likes”, “Mother dislikes”; it is quite a childish interpretation.
There is a clear precise perception of the force and the consciousness at work, and whenever this force and the consciousness are obscured in their action, I have to interfere and rectify the movement. In most cases things are mixed up and there again I have to intervene to separate the distorted transcription from the pure.
Otherwise a great freedom of action is left to all, because the conscious force can express itself in innumerable ways and for the perfection and integrity of the manifestation no ways are to be a priori excluded; a trial is very often given before the selection is made.
~ The Mother, Champaklal’s Treasures, 2008 Edition, pp. 23-24
(This letter was written to Dilip Kumar Roy)
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Open yourself to receive Divine Love
Why didn’t you come yourself? I would have seen you for a few minutes and told you something interesting and helpful as an answer to your letter of this morning.
For, in speaking it would have been better than anything I could write. At Pranam time I felt that you were still depressed. I thought that I would try to pour on you some of the Divine forces. I was looking at you for such a long time and it was Divine love that I was pouring on you with a strong will that you should become conscious of the Divine Presence in you and see all your sorrows turn into Ananda.
I saw to my great joy that you were very receptive to all these Divine forces, and absorbing them without resistance as they were pouring down.
When I read your letter and saw that you thought you had received only some human kindness, it struck me that it was only a misunderstanding of the mind, almost a question of vocabulary that was standing in the way and if you could see this all or most of your doubts would disappear for ever, and with them your painful difficulties.
For what I was pouring in you was not merely human kindness —though surely it contained all that human kindness can be at its best — but Mahalakshmi’s love, Mahasaraswathi’s care, Maheshwari’s embracing and enveloping light.
Do not think of Divine Love as something cold or impersonal or distantly high; it is something as warm and close and tender as any feeling can possibly be. It does not abolish whatever is pure and sweet in human love, but intensifies and sublimates it to its highest. It is this love that the Divine has to give and that you must open yourself to receive.
I think if you realise this, it will be easier for you to force through the mental veil and receive what you are longing to receive.
~ The Mother, Champaklal’s Treasures, 2008 Edition, p. 15
Who is worthy or unworthy in front of the Divine Grace?
All are children of the one and the same Mother.
Her love is equally spread over all of them.
But to each one She gives according to his nature and receptivity.
~ The Mother, CWM, Vol. 14, p. 85
~ Cover image: Fire of Aspiration, a painting based on a vision of Champaklal
~ Design: Beloo Mehra and Biswajita Mohapatra
